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Brady Bacon Perseveres on Thursday, Locks Into Saturday C-Main at Chili Bowl

TULSA, OK — It’s great being good at something, but in a field as deep as the Chili Bowl Nationals, many others can perform just as well. and that’s what bit Brady Bacon on a rare off night during Thursday’s prelim night.

The Broken Arrow, Okla., native started 22nd and finished 10th in the preliminary feature at the Tulsa Expo Center, gaining several positions thanks to two multi-car accidents that helped his No. 21H move forward.

“We were actually really good on the bottom, but there was a long line down there and it’s really hard to cut in line,” Bacon said with a chuckle. “So we weren’t really good enough on the top to get in front of those guys on the bottom and just had to kind of take what we get.”

Bacon started so far back in the A-Main because he had to advance from a B-Main to make the feature. After winning his heat race, the ‘Macho Man’ flipped during his qualifying race. That relegated him to last in the qualifier, which ultimately meant Bacon had to start the second B-Main from fifth place.

By finishing third in the second B-Main, Bacon started 22nd in the 24-car field. A six-car incident on the third lap of the race moved the veteran up to 15th, which became 14th on the restart. Spending 22 of the next 23 laps of the race in 14th place wasn’t part of the plan, but there wasn’t much Bacon could do to advance in the field at that time.

“If the top would’ve been good enough to kind of coax some people out of the way, we could have passed a couple more, but that’s just the way it is sometimes,” Bacon said. “I mean, the track’s different every night here and last night it was all you could do is run the top. And tonight, I mean I know the guys in the front were kind of moving around, but for the most part in the back it was really hard to move off the bottom and that’s just the way it goes sometimes.”

An incident between Parker Jones and CJ Leary gave Bacon two more spots and the final restart, further helping his cause for Saturday with a 10th-place finish and a spot in a C-Main.

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One of the more popular drivers at the Chili Bowl, Bacon’s participation in the annual quest for the coveted Golden Driller is a sort of homecoming for him. His hometown is 20 minutes away from the Expo Center and this is when a lot of his family can see him race in person.

“It’s not only like a homecoming for local Oklahoma people, but this is the only time that all these types of racers are in the same place. Winged racers, non-wing racers, midget racers, late model racers, NASCAR, IndyCar,” Bacon said. “You see a lot of those people that you know, and this might be the only time you see ’em all year also. So it’s just a really fun event. I think it had some kind of growing pains a few years ago, but they kind of embraced what the race is about and it’s supposed to have fun and kind of encouraging the fans and the drivers and the teams to kind of relax a little bit and have fun after the race.”

The Chili Bowl will also be one of the few non-winged races Bacon races all season. After spending years focusing on USAC sprint cars and other non-winged dirt races, Bacon will be running about 80 percent of his races in a winged sprint car in 2025.

“You just change your focus, I mean, there’s more money to be made in winged sprint cars,” Bacon said of his schedule. “We’ve had to focus on our non wing program first and foremost and now we’re kind of flipping that.

“I thought our results were probably getting close to being capped out for as little as we were able to race winged sprint cars. So we’re trying to go there, race more and improve.”

But before he can get to that, he’ll have to eat a little alphabet soup in Tulsa.

Christopher DeHarde has covered IndyCar racing and the Road to Indy for various outlets since 2014. In addition to open wheel racing, DeHarde has also covered IMSA and various short track racing events around Indiana. Originally from New Orleans, DeHarde moved to the Indianapolis area in 2017 to further pursue a career as a motorsports writer.